Silver War: An Officially Unofficial Fan Fiction
by MortalHeart1430
Summary: War has come. Mare, Cal, and the rest of the Rebellion against King Maven have taken the final step and an all out war across the continent ensues. Blood will be drawn on both sides of the fight. But whose side will run dry first? **This is my fan fiction version of what could happen in RQ4. Spoilers for all the previous RQ books!**
1. Chapter 1

ONE

 _Mare_

I fight the urge to punch yet another wall. Pain radiates from my scarlet-marred knuckles all the way up my arm and my shoulder, not doing anything to dispel the thoughts plaguing my mind.

Cal chose his crown. More than that, he's chosen it over me. After swearing up and down for months that he didn't want it, the smallest promise of getting his kingdom back has lured him away from whatever I thought we had. He didn't choose me. _He'll never choose me._

I wish the thought would hurt more. I wish I could bring myself to cry or scream or even punch the wall one more time. But I don't have any emotion left. All I have is the twinge of my abused hand and the sense of utter and complete _emptiness_. Between the battle, and Cal, and everything else that's happened to me in the past year, I'm simply drained.

"You're not saying anything," Farley states plainly, arms crossed over her chest. "Not like any of the Barrows to keep their mouths shut." Though her face is a mask of disinterest, I've known her long enough to recognize the slightest concern in her voice. It should infuriate me, but the lick of anger that shoots through me dies before I even really feel it.

"What am I supposed to say?" I mutter. When I said it in my mind, it came out as a haughty retort. Instead, it comes out flat. The muddy ground slops around my boots as I turn to slink back against the cool rock wall behind me. I can't meet Farley's gaze—not right now, not like this—so I cast my gaze down to the battered flesh of my hand.

I poke at one of the dark bruises, nearly black beneath the skin. The pain is biting, but momentary, and I barely have time to wince before it ebbs back into a dull ache. I wouldn't be surprised if I've fractured a bone or two. Maybe even broken one.

I'm reminded of Gisa's hand, after that chaotic day in Summerton, what feels like a lifetime ago. Her slim fingers, better suited to sewing than thieving, catching on a Silver's bag as she tried to rob them. To help me, I recall. To help steal the money Kilorn and I would need to pay Farley to escape conscription. Gisa's been healed since, as I'm sure I'll be soon enough. But I don't think the image of shattering bones and bruise-painted skin afterward will ever be purged from my mind.

"This alliance had to happen, Mare," Premier Davidson interjects, breaking me from my reverie with his patented calm tone. I meet his impassive gaze with a glare. _How dare you lecture me on what had to happen? You don't know me. You don't get to talk to me right now._ Ignoring the flurry of messages I try to convey through my eyes, Davidson just continues. "With the war in the Lakelands over, the King is finally able to dedicate his time and forces to defeating the Revolution. With a King on our side, the rightful King that Maven helped usurp, we will be more powerful than ever. And with the Reds and Newbloods _and_ Silvers behind him? Tiberias will be undefeatable."

 _His name is Cal,_ I want to snap at the Premier. _Tiberias is his father._ But the words don't make it past my lips. I can't find it in me to fight for him right now.

"Fighting together," Davidson continues in his placating voice, "we can wipe Archeon off the map, and the boy king along with it."

Even the thought of Maven cuts through me, sharper than any blade of Evangeline Samos. After all he's done, the pain he's caused and the blood he's spilt, I want nothing more than to storm the capital and separate his twisted head from the rest of his body. I want to display it on a pike for all in the kingdom to see that true evil can be defeated.

But the Premier doesn't know Cal like I do. He doesn't know about our conversation, about Cal's musings on whether or not his brother could be _fixed_. If, by some miracle, someone could reverse the irreparable damage Elara inflicted on him growing up. Davidson wants Cal and Maven to kill each other. He doesn't know that Cal, for all his posturing and planning, can never hurt his brother if there is any chance that he doesn't have to. Even a miniscule chance. Even this fool's chance.

He believes Cal is a weapon to be wielded. He doesn't know that Cal will break with the Guard and go his own way the moment his needs aren't being met. But again, I don't tell Davidson my thoughts. I'm too exhausted. Instead, I simply shrug at him and drop my gaze. "Whatever."

To my side, Farley scoffs. Though motherhood has softened her at moments, I can tell she's getting fed up with my angsty teenager bullshit. I'm surprised she's tolerated it as long as she has, actually.

The Premier stares at me, awkwardly fidgeting with one hand. His lips work overtime, trying to form words before he can even figure out which he wants to say. In the end, he says nothing, as we are interrupted by subtle _whoosh_ of air as Arezzo appears beside Davidson. Once, I might have jumped at the sudden intrusion. Now, I barely notice. So much time with Shade helped me in that regard.

My gaze falls on the teleporter's shaking hands and wide eyes as she reaches out and puts a hand on the Premier's shoulder. Her voice trembles as she speaks. "Sir. You're needed in Command."

He furrows a brow, a question forming on his lips. But, before he or anyone else can get a word out, both Arezzo and the Premier disappear. I'm left alone in the street with Farley. Both of us wait a moment before speaking, still processing what's just happened.

Farley takes a step in the direction from which we've come. "Come on. Let's go see what the fuss is all about. I'll be damned if the Princeling shuts me out of a meeting now that he's got his crown back."

She's already a good distance away before she realizes I haven't moved with her. She halts, turning back to me with a questioning gaze. "Mare?"

His crown. His _crown_. The words swirl in my head incessantly, taunting me, driving me as mad as the boy who currently wears the dreadful crown of fire and flames.

It was easy to label Maven as the evil brother the night he snatched that blasted piece of metal from his father's still-cooling silverblood. A child driven by a lust for power. Strength. It was easy to make him a villain. But right now, I can only think that Cal may be exactly the same, if not worse. A man promised the throne his whole life, only for his brother to steal it out from under him. He's vengeful. His bloodlust unmatched. If given the chance, would he be a better ruler than Maven? Worse? Or, in the worst of worse possibilities, could he be exactly the same?

"I wish I'd never met him," I mutter under my breath. I only realize I've spoken aloud when Farley cocks her head to the side in confusion.

She crosses her arms again and steps back toward me. "Cal?"

I nod. "Don't you think about it? How different the world would be if I had never come into the picture?" Maven had asked me something similar one day at Whitefire. The day I'd had the opportunity to drown him in the bath. The day I'd been too weak to end all of this. He'd asked me if I would take it all back. Going to the Palace, losing my brother, causing so much death. My answer had been easy then. _No._ So what's changed?

 _Cal,_ my mind taunts me. _Cal's changed._ I've felt true heartbreak, and it somehow hurts more than anything else I've endured so far.

Farley shrugs, though I can see her composure slipping. She's pissed at me for even thinking about this. _Join the club._ "Dwelling on the past is pointless, Mare. We can't change what happened. And even if we could, _nothing_ that's happened is entirely on you. This revolution would have happened with or without you."

"Maybe," I acknowledge, leaning my pulsing head back against the wall and shutting my eyes against the beaming sun above. Exhaustion and the migraine poking needles into my brain make my bones feel like nothing more than dead limbs on the winter trees back in the Stilts. "But not with the Newbloods."

Farley pauses, considering this. To my surprise, she doesn't argue. "You're right. We would have built our forces, but never enough. It would have been a bloodbath. Especially for the Reds. Without you, without the Newbloods, no one would have thought any sort of revolution possible."

Tears prick my eyes, though I don't know if it's from sheer emotion, the throb in my head, the biting ache in my hand, or all three working together against me. "Do you ever wonder if maybe it would have been for the best?"

The ugly question hangs stagnant in the air for a moment, neither of us willing to touch it immediately. Eventually, Farley tries. "You don't mean–"

"I mean," I cut her off, "that a lot less blood would be running in the streets of Norta, of the entire continent, right now if I'd never gotten that job at the palace. If I'd never gone looking for a way out of conscription."

Farely bristles at the insinuation. She's the one who gave us the astronomical price for escaping conscription. I guess in her mind, by blaming that for all our troubles, I'm also blaming her. I'm not, but I don't get the chance to explain before she's doling out her words, each sentence like another blow. "If you'd never gone looking, you'd be dead by now. Kilorn too, probably. The boy's great at fishing and talking, but not exactly fighting. Not to mention the dozens of other Red soldiers, murdered every day on the front lines."

"Are they any better off now?" I shoot back. "Look around. Blood flows in rivers all around us. It's everywhere. That's all I see anymore is _blood_. We kill them. They kill us in retaliation. It doesn't even matter where it started anymore. It's blood for blood for blood for blood until we're all bled dry. Red and Silver." I take a breath, recomposing myself. I hadn't meant to say this much, especially not to Farley. But it's been a thought dragging on my mind for far longer than I care to admit. "We know the price being paid. But what's the cost? The real cost?" I open my eyes to look at her. Anger, confusion, and a deep, profound disappointment fight for dominance on her face. "Do we fight to make sure that everyone knows loss equally? So no one goes to sleep at night without fearing to not see the dawn the next morning? You can't tell me you don't think about what life would be if I'd never fallen into Queenstrial."

"I try to focus more on the here and now, the people I've sworn to protect and fight for, instead of moping about," she retorts, her calm façade from earlier quickly melting into nonexistence.

"I'm sorry," I scoff. "Are you saying that you haven't noticed that, even after all the bloodshed, we're headed straight back to square one here? Cal on the throne? Silvers in charge, or completely wiped out. Neither side even considering a happy medium."

"Mare–"

"No, you know what?" I continue, so far gone, I don't even care anymore. "Forget all of that. Forget the Reds and the Silvers and the Newbloods for five seconds. Think of yourself. If I'd never met Cal, Shade would be alive." His name sticks in my throat, but I continue anyway. "Clara would have a father, and you'd be happy, no matter the war's outcome." I shrug, shoulders and head growing ever heavier with the headache eating at the base of my skull. "Tell me I'm wrong."

Farley's contemplative grimace twists into a positively feral snarl, and it is at this moment that I realize how monumentally I have overstepped. She stalks across the street to me, looking like a woman possessed. She pulls me forward by my good arm, so harshly I fear she might dislocate my shoulder, and slaps me clear across the face.

I stifle a gasp as the _crack_ resonates through the empty streets of Corvium. Farley may not be Silver, not a strongarm with muscles of steel, but her blow still sends me staggering backward. I bring my uninjured hand up to my face, the touch cool against the hot blood flowing to the handprint burning on my cheek. When I finally meet her eyes with my own incredulous stare, her lips are set in a thin line and her eyes shoot daggers through me.

"How dare you." She doesn't shout. She doesn't need to. Her quiet, perfect articulation is lethal. "Shade gave his life for this cause. Because that's who he was. If this particular chain of events hadn't happened, he'd still probably be dead sooner or later because that's just _who he was_. Same as me." She gestures to the scars on her face, stark in the harsh sunlight. "I wear my scars, even knowing a healer could take them away, even knowing that they're not the _prettiest_ , because I _earned_ them. Because I am a fighter and, like Shade, I would die for this cause. That's who _I_ am."

I gulp, suddenly cotton mouthed. I want to speak, to tell her I understand, that I'm sorry. Where I can't find the words to interject, Farley seems to steal my diction for herself and continue. "And Cal is taking that crown because it's who _he_ is. He may be kind, and brilliant, and decent looking. But, stars above, Mare, he's a Prince. A _Silver_ Prince. It's who he has always been, whether you've forgotten or not. The crown of Norta is what he's been working for his entire life. It's his birthright. And as much as you want this to be some pretty little fantasy world where the boy sacrifices everything for the girl, it's not going to happen. Because Cal knows, in his heart, who he is, Mare."

She pauses, features softening as the tension in her shoulder seeps from her muscles. She reaches out to touch and I almost flinch, before I realize she's just reaching for my hand. "I know it hurts right now. It hurts like a bitch, because you really did love him." _Love._ I bristle at the word. Of course I loved him. I'd admitted as much to him. But it was so much stranger to hear someone else say it. "But you can't give up everything about yourself chasing after him. He knows who he is," she reiterates, squeezing my hand. "But do you know who you are, Mare Barrow?"

 _No_. The answer pops into my head immediately, much to my despair. I am only eighteen years old. I've spent the better part of the past year trying to save everyone I care about, and trying to save the world from falling into ruin in the meantime. I've trusted people and I've been betrayed. I thought I knew people, thought I knew what drove them, only to find out that my instincts could not be more wrong. And now, staring into Farley's eyes, hearing her question, I wonder if all that pain and confusion is because I don't know myself at all.

Her words still echo in my mind when a runner dashes around the corner, nearly tripping over his own two feet as he approaches Farley. Not a Newblood, but rather a Red soldier. Judging by the sun embroidered on the sash around his wrist, he's one of Farley's men. Well, a boy, really. He can't be more than sixteen. Farley catches him by the arm as he tries to stop, slipping in the mud. "Coulson," she acknowledges him. "What's wrong?"

Coulson coughs, still trying to reign in his breathing. "Command, ma'am." I think I catch a glimmer of irritation in Farley's eyes at the moniker, but it's gone before I can be sure it was anything more than a trick of the light. "They need you in Command."

"What's going on?"

The boy's eyes fall on me, but flick back to Farley almost instantly. "The king," he stutters. "There's a broadcast."

"He's on the screen more than he's on his throne lately. What's different about this speech?"

Again, Coulson's gaze shifts to me, an accusatory glare flaring behind cool grey. "It's not just a speech."

The door to the administrative tower is ajar when we reach it. Premier Davidson, Colonel Farley, Queen Anabel, and the entire Samos family await us. And Cal, of course. Only Evangeline seems to notice our arrival, which she acknowledges with a short dip of her head in my direction before nailing her eyes back to the video screen which enraptures the room's other occupants.

Maven's familiar features do, in fact, grace the screen. Harsh shadows below his eyes—the ones so like his mother's—age him, making him seem far older than just seventeen. The crown of flames, _that cursed piece of metal that everyone seems so obsessed with_ , weighs down his carefully styled curls. But he does not seem weighted. He seems strangely _happy_.

He speaks animatedly from a podium, though the frame is too cropped for me to tell anything about where he is, other than the fact that he certainly isn't at Whitefire. Still, the lights, the pale white color of the vaulted walls and ceilings behind him tickle the edges of my memory with a vague sense of recognition.

"What's he doing?" I ask the deathly silent room. Cal is the only one to even notice my words. He tears his gaze away from the video screen to meet mine, searching for something in my eyes. An answer, I guess. Resolution. Something to say that we're okay after our fight. Subtly, I shake my head at him. This isn't the time. Farley's right. Cal has his duty, his life. And I have mine.

"Just watch," Davidson mutters. In his hands, he holds a smaller video screen. A flick of his wrist brings the volume on the larger screen up, and Maven's voice fills the space.

"Even in the face of betrayal, Norta is strong as ever," he announces, to the cheers of thousands. The way the sound echoes brings forward flashes of memories from the not so distant past, but I can't put two and two together. I'm too distracted by the words befalling the little King's mouth. "We rise, ever more powerful."

The camera pulls back slightly, allowing the person beside him to come into view. Iris Cygnet. Princess of the Lakelanders and now, Queen of Norta. Maven's wife. Like the first time I met her, she does not wear the dripping jewels or ostentatious clothing of a courtier. Rather, she wears a simple light blue gown, tied with a garish sash of red and black around her waist. A crown of golden flames interspersed with sapphires in the shape of water droplets adorns her dark hair. Though I try not to notice, my eyes also fall to the wedding band on her finger.

Cal's voice cuts through the room. "Who the hell is that?"

"Your new sister-in-law," Ptolemus sneers.

"The Lakelands and Norta stand now, united as one," Maven continues, gripping Iris's hand. It's not the awkward touch he occasionally shared with Evangeline, but it's also not the comforting touch he shared with me. It's political, kind. But not loving. "And together, I give you my word that every last member of the Scarlet Guard will be hunted down and destroyed within the year. Soon, the peace we've worked to create will no longer be threatened by these terrorists!"

The crowd cheers, and suddenly the room around is stifling. This time, I can't tell if it's Cal's doing, or my own lungs failing me.

"And, my dear people, I assure you," Maven adds when the crowd dies down a little. He turns to the camera with a fierce expression, one not meant for anyone around him, or anyone else that may be watching. His look cuts through the screen directly into me, as if he stands only a few feet away. Whatever is about to happen, it's for me and me alone. "I am nothing if not a man of my word."

Maven claps, shattering the moment. I have to force myself not to jump at the sudden intrusion on our moment. "But enough talk. Let's get to it. The real reason you've all tuned in today." The camera cuts from Maven's close-up to an all too familiar sight that sets my teeth on edge. Judging from the tension in Cal's shoulders, I can tell he recognizes the arena as well.

When I lived in the Stilts, arenas full of people were a weekly occurrence. Feats in which Silvers fought each other with abilities helped to keep would-be rebels from hoping and dreaming of ever defeating the Silver elite. But this isn't any arena. It's the Bowl of Bones. And this is no ordinary Feat. "The Scarlet Guard may soon be extinct, but to the Newbloods only, who I've welcomed into my home, who have betrayed both myself and the country, I provide these small mercies."

On one side of the arena, from a doorway I recognize intimately, a man steps forward, an Arven Silent ghosting behind him. One hand grips a shiny sword, while a few inches above, his wrists are wrapped in familiar Silent Stone manacles. I vaguely remember him from my time at Whitefire. But he's not a lord of one of the High Houses. He's not even Silver. He is one of Maven's Newblood recruits. A Wrecker, I remember. Like Nix or Damarian, with virtually indestructible skin. A feeling of dread pools in my stomach and I pull into myself as the realization dawns on me. The change in posture does not go unnoticed by Farley, who glances from me back to the screen with an increased sense of anxiety.

A woman around my mother's age enters from the other side of the Bowl of Bones, looking small in her ill-fitting armor. The small battle ax weighs her tiny arms down more than the manacles or the Arven woman behind her. Her familiar features are another slap in the face. Her, I certainly remember. Halley. She'd been a servant for an Eagrie family. I was there the day she came before Maven and showed us her ability–detecting the abilities of other. It was this ability that allowed her to expose Nanny, the shapeshifting Newblood Cal had sent to court to keep tabs on me. Nanny had chosen the Scarlet Guard's way out and swallowed a suicide pill before she could be interrogated, much to Maven's dismay. The memory makes me shudder.

Maven's threats from months ago wander back into my mind. While I stayed at Whitefire, the Newbloods I helped lure there would be safe. Cared for like the soldiers Maven wanted to turn them into. But if I went against him, fought him, they wouldn't be so lucky.

I didn't just leave. I escaped, along with fifty other Newbloods, and the entire Samos family. I'd humiliated him on his wedding day, of all days. And now, with his second defeat at Corvium, he's facing an uprising. Watching the video screen now, it seems that he hasn't exactly turned the other cheek. He knows what he's doing. And somehow, though I'm not sure how, he knows I'm watching. He knows how much this will hurt me.

"Lords Arven, if you please," Maven says in a booming voice, gesturing to the two Newbloods' Silent guards. They follow his cue, backing out of the arena and leaving the two terrified Reds alone to face each other. The guards don't, I notice with a lurch of nausea, remove the Silent Stone manacles.

"I don't understand." Farley squints at the screen in confusion. "If it's an arena fight between Newbloods, why does he leave the manacles on?"

"Because it's not just a fight," I answer in barely more than a whisper.

Cal inclines his head in my direction, nodding without looking at me. "It's an execution."

No one answers. We can only watch. Everyone in the room is painfully aware of just how far away from the capital we are. How useless we are to stop this.

Along the wall of the arena, dozens of Silvers step forward. Judging from the colors emblazoned on their uniforms, and the fact that they all wear the same face, they—rather, _he_ —hails from House Tyros. Clones. But they don't attack. They merely seem to guard the exits, ready to stop any attempt at escape.

"Begin," Maven bellows. The Bowl of Bones surges with the cheers of thousands of Silvers. Both Halley and the Wrecker hesitate, staying where they are in confusion. Even from here, I can see the tremors running through them. _I did this. My words brought them to Archeon. And my escape put them in this prison of death._

The moments of inactivity in the arena are broken by a sudden flurry of activity as both the Newbloods fall to their knees, choking and clutching at their throats. Among the sea of Tyros faces appear two tall Silvers with dark skin and equally dark eyes, clad in the blue uniforms. Lakelands windweavers. The ones who survived or didn't make it to the battle at Corvium only a few hours ago. Maven certainly is quick on his feet, I'll give him that.

Maven waves a hand at the Lakelanders, and they release Halley and the Wrecker instantly, allowing the air they've stolen back into their lungs. Both champions collapse into the fine sand.

"Come now," Maven condescends to them, as if they are nothing more than stubborn children refusing to listen to reason. "Play nicely. This does not have to be the end. For one of you at least," he adds with a cruel, cold smirk.

My heart sinks as his words rattle me. _Small mercies,_ he'd said.

Cal was wrong. We both were. This isn't an execution. It's so much worse.

This is a fight to the death. And there can be only one winner.

There will be no martyr tonight. No Red blood spilt by the unmatched Silvers. This won't be ammunition against the elite, as the executions of the old days may once have been. This is different. The only Red blood spilled tonight will be drawn by another Red. Newblood versus Newblood.

The Feats of First Friday delighted in shedding Silver blood to show us that we were inferior beings. To keep us in our place. But now, with this little show, Maven has unlocked an even worse way of smothering the rebellion, one that replaces the all-too-valuable Silver blood with the disposable crimson blood that flows in our veins. His message speaks volumes, even without him speaking a word.

Even with abilities, even with power, we will always be Red. We will always be disposable. We will always be inferior. Tonight, one Red will die, and one will walk out of the arena alive, if only in body. As I turn to leave the administration building, I wonder which would be worse. To die at the hands of someone you thought was your friend? Or to be the one forced to take that life, and then live with it for the rest of your own existence?


	2. Chapter 2

**_A/N: It just found chapter 2 on my computer and thought I'd share it. I don't think I ever did rewrites/edits, and it's been nearly a year since I've written this, but I thought I'd share all the same._**

TWO

 _Mare_

I don't wait to see the details of the arena fight. Who lives, who dies. Though I'm sure I'll find out soon enough, I can't allow more blood to seep onto my hands. I wish I could save everyone, make a pact to never add another face to my mental wall of the dead. But, whether in that arena or on the killing fields of the war we've officially waged against Maven, people are going to die. Newbloods, Reds, and Silvers alike. No matter what I've done, that much is inevitable. And when the fighting starts, I want to be ready. I don't have any other option.

The words grate at my patience even as I traverse the complicated maze of streets of Corvium towards the infirmary. It's a bit of a walk from the control tower—hiding in the tunnels below the city—so I have far too much time to think before I get there. I hate situations where there's only one option. When there's no choice to be made at all. It makes me feel cornered, like my hand is being forced. Like I don't actually have control over my actions.

Then again, that's been my life for the past year hasn't it? Falling into unwinnable situations, being told my one option, and then running with it? In the Stilts, I knew my options, knew I only really had one. At eighteen, I was supposed to go to the war. There was no escape. And when I tried, I somehow ended up on the path that led me to Maven and his mother. More ultimatums. More choices made for me. Escaping that meant allying with the Scarlet Guard and doing whatever they needed me too. Between being their mouthpiece, a voice for the Newbloods, and Maven's puppet, I barely even know what choice is anymore.

I shake my head, pulling my arms tight against my chest as I step down into the subterranean levels of Corvium. The sudden chill in comparison with the muggy heat of the coming summer above only adds to my headache. _No. I am in control of myself_. A flicker of my electricity ghosts over my skin as if reassuring myself of the words I think. If Cal gets to make his own choices, choose what's best for him and his people, so be it. They're his people. Maybe it's time for me to go back to my roots. The girl who protects her own first and others if she has time—and if she particularly cares to. I am the lightning girl, damn it. And anyone with Red blood is my family, ability or no.

"Mare," Wren Skonos says to me by way of greeting as I duck my head into the infirmary. Plenty of the white-clothed beds along the wall are free of the rust color of dried blood, but I don't move for any of them. Instead, I stand in the doorway, cradling my stinging hand gingerly.

Wren waves a hand, dismissing me for a moment as she finishes checking on a Red boy whose arm ends at his elbow. Wren must have been busy. From what I understand, the boy in the bed lost most of that side of his body in the attack. Even though they're dry and clean, I can almost feel the tack of drying blood making the fingers on my good hand stick together.

"The bleeding hell happened to you?" says a voice to my right. I turn my attention from the healer—whose ability now lends itself to causing the boy's arm to reform and regrow toward where his hand would eventually return—to the least concerning pain in my ass at the moment, Cameron. She wears an apron smeared with grease, and rubber gloves that reach nearly to her shoulders, along with goggles on a face covered in more grime than her apron. If it weren't for the gloves, reminding me so much of the ones the Arvens wore as my guards in my hellhole of a prison at Whitefire, I might laugh at the incredulity of the outfit. Instead, I have to repress a shudder as I follow her eyes to my broken hand.

I pull as much of my usual gravitas and grace into my expression as I can and smirk at her. "Strongarm. In the battle." I shrug, the movement sending a jolt of pain through the arm. "Probably wasn't the best idea. It was like punching a brick wall."

"Is that right?" The snarky retort isn't courtesy of our little group's master of snarky retorts, but rather Wren, who has finally taken a break from her magical bone growth to grace us with her presence. I still don't have a read on the woman. She and Evangeline are apparently close friends, but, while she did journey all the way to Corvium to help with the warfront, I still can't forget the days she watched me wasting away in Maven's cage from effects even her ability could not touch. Still, she's the only healer on duty right now, and I can't wait for this hand to fix itself.

Thankfully, instead of following up her less-than-convinced response with more questions, Wren merely takes my hand in hers and begins. Cameron rolls her eyes at this.

"What happened to the Premier's rule about twenty-four hours for non-emergency wounds?" she snaps.

"I," Wren mutters, eyes closed in concentration, "do not answer to Premier Davidson."

I silently thank her for the answer. While it only seems to incense Cameron further, causing her to tap her foot and scowl menacingly at the healer, it saves me from explaining my sudden move to action. From having to explain to Cameron that I am yet again at fault for people like us dying at the hands of a mad king.

Endorphins rush as the bones in my hand reassemble and fuse back in the correct setting. The effect is almost dizzying, and succeeds in taking my mind off the shitstorm at hand for at least a few moments. Though Wren pokes and prods at the bones, and occasionally picks at the skin to remove bits of brick lodged in my knuckles, I feel nothing. Marvelous, blissful nothing.

Unfortunately, the distraction is over almost as soon as it began. Wren drops my healed hand unceremoniously and turns to face Cameron, her calculating eyes sliding over the girl's clothing with a look of distaste. "You can't be in here dressed like that."

Cameron scoffs at this. "I can be wherever I bleeding want, dressed however I bleeding like, thank you very much." She sputters on furiously, though she seems to have forgotten me entirely. Wren holds up a smooth hand to stop the girl's tirade.

"I only meant that it's covered in potential infection-causing agents. We can't have it in a sickroom."

"Thought you could heal anything."

"I can. But a broken arm is simple. A missing arm is simple. An infected wound takes more time than any of us have. And," she adds with a twist of her lips, "your presence does tend to cause duress to our patients."

"Look, Lady. I'm just here looking for Ptolemus. He's supposed to help me with this thing I'm working on, but he pulled a no-show."

"If you're looking for Prince Samos, then why have you come here?" The name still feels strange. Definitely unearned. What has Ptolemus Samos ever done to deserve the title _Prince_?

This time, it's Cameron's turn to smile wickedly. "Because the two of you seem to be attached at the hip. Where one of you is, the other tends to be lurking in the shadows somewhere nearby."

A patch of gray brushes the tops of Wren's ears in a blush of Silverblood. "I haven't seen Lem all day." Cameron opens her mouth to protest, but Wren is already continuing. "But I suppose I can check his quarters. Let him know that you were looking."

Ever the image of a Silver lady, Wren's being flustered does not impugn her dignity, and she leaves us with her shoulders held back and head held high. Only I can see the worry in her eyes. I can imagine why. She's a Lady of Norta. He's a Prince of a whole new kingdom. A married one, at that. Is his love even his to give? Begrudgingly, Cal pops into my mind. Betrothed to a woman he does not love and, supposedly, in love with a girl he can't ever be with. In that moment, I see more of myself in Wren than I have in probably any Silver ever. Perhaps that's why my brain jumps ahead of my conscious thought and leans in to Wren as she leaves the room to tell her, "He's not in his quarters. Check control. That's where we were a moment ago."

Wren nods her thanks and then leaves. Cameron's eyes watch me carefully. "What's got you and Ptolemus Samos dragged up to control?"

I can't tell her. I _shouldn't_ tell her. I'm one of the leaders of the Scarlet Guard. Prioritization of information is key. Telling Cameron could cause word to spread, could cause a panic. I can not tell her.

After a moment, seeing the undercurrent of worry in her eyes for news devastating enough to call the major power players to Control, my resolve turns to dust and I tell her. Everything.

The arena fight. The Newbloods. Maven's promise of destroying the Scarlet Guard. It all comes flowing out of my mouth from the safety of a secluded alcove down the hall from the fort's infirmary. Because I have no self-control? Probably. But Cameron needs to hear it. And she takes it all in stride. In fact, I see some of the tension in her shoulders lift as the story unfolds, even after some of the grittier details I share with her. She doesn't care about them, I realize. Not as much as she cares about those we left behind in Piedmont, like her twin brother, Morrey. The news she dreaded was averted. As far as we know, her brother lives another day, and that's enough to keep Cameron calm and collected as I wrap up the sorry tale of the twisted boy king and open up the floor for questions.

She kind of sits there for a while, not speaking. She's processing, of course, but more. Plotting, strategizing. She's trying to figure out our next move. Though Cameron might claim violence and war are things to be hated and avoided at all costs, she's sure good at them. In that moment, she reminds me of Cal. The warrior who wants only peace, seeking the easiest way to get there. The path of least resistance—and bloodshed. Stars, is there anything that doesn't remind me of Cal today? I am not some fucking lovesick puppy, not like Maven. I will not let this destroy me. I set my jaw and mentally prepare myself as Cameron finally reaches the point of speaking.

"Why are you telling me all of this?"

I shake my head in confusion. "What?"

"This seems like the kind of thing you normally talk about with Cal."

I roll my eyes. "If you don't want to talk about it—"

"No, I do," she insists. "I'm just wondering why you're suddenly not trusting Maven's brother." She drops her voice to a whisper. "Is he working with—"

"No!" I snap, probably too forcefully. "No, of course not."

"Then what? You should be in Control right now, figuring out next steps. Instead you're, what? Fixing a hand I know you didn't break in the battle? Telling me everything because of the pure goodness in your heart? Come on. Why me and not Cal?"

This is not where I need this conversation to go. I shrug. "Cal and I aren't exactly…" I search for the word. "Amiable right now."

"Mom and dad are fighting." Cameron sighs, leaning against the wall. "Great."

"We're not fighting."

"Sounds like you're fighting. A big, ugly couples' fight that makes me want to vomit nails."

"We're not—" I cut myself off this time. What are Cal and I doing? "It doesn't matter. I'm here getting my hand fixed because I lost control for a minute. Because I am thinking next steps, and, if I'm right, I need to be at the top of my game for what comes next."

"Yeah, but you're not thinking about it with Cal?"

"Enough about Cal, Cameron. Please. I can make my own decisions without the Princeling around." I suck down a lungful of the thick, chilled air. "I thought you hated Cal, anyway."

"Oh, I bleeding despise His Royal Pain In My Ass. My grandest dreams are of the different ways I can split him in two without killing him just to watch him bleed to death. I wish he'd never been born." She pauses, thinks, shrugs. "But he's better to talk to than a brick wall." She nods at my hands. "Better to punch, too."

I fist my hands together in front of me, knuckles white and face a straight line.

"Alright. I get it. No Cal talk. Fine. What _do_ you want to talk about?"

I shrug. Honestly, who the hell even knows anymore? "Are you worried about Morrey back in Piedmont?"

The sudden change in topic has Cameron shifting on her feet, twirling a loose string from her apron between her fingers. "A little. But not for long. I'm fixing up the radio tower that was damaged in the battle. When it's done, Cal—" she pauses, tasting the name in her mouth, and then seeming to think better of it: "The prince whose name we do not speak and I are going to fix the wiring and try to boost the signal on this old spy network he's been using. It's off the grid in Norta, but they should be able to receive it at the base in Piedmont. We set up the other end of the network before we left. Hopefully, soon enough we should have open communication to the base."

I nod, sincerely impressed. "So that's what you need Ptolemus for."

She sneers at his name. "He offered to help Princeling after Princeling offered to help me. Honestly, the pretty boy spends more time chasing skirts and transforming metal into mirrors to check himself out than he does actually assisting in anything but," she shrugs again, "he gets the job done. Albeit it slowly. _Very_ slowly."

"Sounds about right." I don't miss the off tone in my voice and neither does Cameron.

To my surprise, her next words lack her signature edge, taking on a more sympathetic tone than anything else I've ever heard from her. So soft I wonder if the war has changed her already. Tempered her. "None of us have forgotten what he did to Shade, Mare. And we're never going to. He's a tool." She narrows her eyes. "In all senses of the word."

That brings a smile to my lips. But even that small gesture feels fake. "Thanks."

"Anytime." She slaps me on the shoulder rather painfully and suddenly. "Now, do the whole resistance a favor and snap out of it."

"I'm fine, Cameron."

"No. You're all sad and emotional and it's making you stupid. How about using your bleeding head for once?" So much for being changed. I should have known. Cameron's from New Town, one of the Red techie slums. If the tattoo on her neck and her roughness are any indication, she's not the type to be broken so easily. Compared to her life before, I'm sure this is a walk in the park. "Look, Cal's a Prince, so he gets his say in what comes next. I get that. But him having a voice doesn't mean you lose yours. Buck up."

"Gee," I mutter under my breath. "Thanks. Only one problem. He's not the Prince anymore. He's got the backing of House Samos. His grandmother. He's going after his crown. He's going to be King."

"Of the Silvers," Cameron says. "He's the Silver King, Mare. He will always put them first. House Samos, his family. They're fighting for the Silvers, and the Silvers alone. Farley and the Guard are fighting for the Reds. Who's fighting for _us_ in Control?" She barks out a harsh laugh. "Davidson? Montfort? People we don't even really know. I mean, can we trust them?"

"You don't know me," I point out. "You certainly don't trust me."

She doesn't hesitate. "I trust you more than anyone else here." I raise an eyebrow at her, waiting for the _gotcha!_ , or just for her to recant her statement. She shrugs. "I know. We're all bleeding doomed and Hell must be freezing over. Get over it, Lightning Girl."

I shrug. That's about as much as I imagine you get from someone like Cameron Cole. I move to hug her, but she holds up a hand to ward me off, her eyes shooting to the size of the lenses in her goggles.

"No, no," she says simply. "That's okay. No hugging necessary."

I heave a laugh—a real and genuine one, to my surprise—and turn to stalk down the hall. It's like a weight off my shoulders. Farley and Cameron are right. Cal's a leader, a King by birth. This is his playing field. Just like Farley, and Wren, and Cameron, he's found where he best contributes to help his people. It's time for me to find mine. To figure out where a jaded thief from the Stilts fits in with a global revolution.

Cameron's voice stops me halfway down the forgotten corridor. "Barrow," she calls. I glance at her over my shoulder. A blush has rushed to her cheeks and, if I thought a young woman with features like hers could look sheepish, she would look it now. "Don't you dare tell Calore I called him Dad. He'll never let me live that one down."

I don't respond. I only turn, hiding the ridiculous smile that spreads across my face. The worst thing is that she's not far off. Both Cal and I have people depending on us. The problem is that we're both starting to notice our children are not the same as the other's. Still, if I remember one thing growing up, it's that a family stays together. So, as much as I want to murder him for all he's done, as much as I want to mummify him alive and set his living corpse on fire and throw it into the deepest point of the ocean I can find, Cal and I have to talk. We have to work together. Otherwise this war may end before it even really begins.


End file.
